


Jack 'n' the Pox

by sahiya



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, Multi, chickenpox
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-07
Updated: 2011-01-07
Packaged: 2017-10-14 12:57:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,648
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/149444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sahiya/pseuds/sahiya
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>As good as fifty-first century immune systems might be, there are some things they just aren't prepared for.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Jack 'n' the Pox

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Wendymr/WMR](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Wendymr%2FWMR).
  * Inspired by [Through a Glass Darkly](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/2200) by Wendymr/WMR. 



> Apologies for the title. I just couldn't resist!

“How’s he doing?” Rose asked, leaning in the doorway of Jack’s room. “Any better?”

The Doctor sighed and shifted on the bed, leaning over to put the thermometer back on the bedside table. “Not really,” he said. “Worst case I’ve ever seen. He’s got the bloody things everywhere. _Everywhere_.”

Rose winced. “I’m really sorry. I had no idea Tony was going to come down with chickenpox while we were there, or that Jack had never had them. Though I guess I should’ve known - he didn’t even grow up on Earth.” She supposed there must have been childhood diseases of some sort on Schattenwelt, but apparently chickenpox wasn’t among them.

“Not your fault,” the Doctor said. “I didn’t think about it either.”

Rose came and sat gingerly on the edge of the bed. Beneath the blankets, Jack was a shivering bundle of misery smothered in anti-itch cream the TARDIS medbay had provided. It was very effective, which at least spared him the oven mitt treatment Rose’s mum had given her when she’d had chickenpox, but it wore off every couple of hours. Poor Jack truly had pox everywhere, which made reapplying the cream tedious and time consuming for all parties involved, especially in the middle of a night cycle. Itching aside, he was much more ill than Tony had been. His fever stubbornly refused to drop below thirty-nine degrees, and he hadn’t kept any food down in over a day.

Speaking of which. “I made some chicken broth,” she said to the Doctor. “I put some ginger in it to help settle his stomach. Think it’s worth a try?”

“Dunno,” the Doctor said. He leaned over and brushed Jack’s hair back with a tender, careful hand. “Think you can try some chicken broth, lad?" Jack groaned and burrowed deeper into the covers. The Doctor grimaced. "I know, but you need fluids. If you won’t drink anything, I’ll have to put you on an IV.”

Jack sighed and unburied himself enough to say, “Fine. You win. I’ll try the chicken broth.”

“Good lad,” the Doctor said, smoothing his hair again. “Rose, I’ll go ahead and get it, if you don’t mind staying with him. I need a few things from the medbay as well.” Not to mention, Rose thought, a few minutes outside this room. The Doctor had hardly left Jack’s side since he’d got sick, and for a man accustomed to the whole of time and space, one small bedroom must feel horribly confining.

“Sure,” she said, even as she felt a little flutter of . . . something. Nervousness, maybe. Or anxiety. Jack had made it clear, even without saying so, that he preferred to have the Doctor close by. Rose had made herself useful by doing laundry, making soup, and running the occasional oatmeal bath, while leaving the hands-on nursing to the Doctor. She and Jack hadn’t known each other that long, comparatively, and having the chickenpox was an experience low on dignity. She didn’t blame Jack for not wanting her to see him like this.

“Good. I’ll be just a minute,” he added to Jack.

“Hurry back,” Jack said, sounding bereft.

Rose waited until the Doctor had gone and then shifted up closed to Jack. “You need more cream anywhere?” she asked, tentatively.

“No, I’m okay for now,” Jack said, in a rough, thin voice.

“I’m really sorry about this.”

“Not your fault. Like you said, you didn’t know."

“No, but still. If it weren’t for my little brother . . .” Rose sighed. She supposed there wasn’t much use in apologizing, really. What was done was done, and even with a time machine there wasn’t any way for her to go back and undo this. “Anyway, I’m sorry. And I promise, that’s the last time I’m saying it.”

“Good,” Jack said. He looked at her through eyes that were barely open. “C’mere,” he murmured, lifting the corner of his duvet. “‘m too out of it to talk. I just want a cuddle.”

Rose smiled. “I can do that, yeah.” At least until the Doctor got back. She quickly stripped off her jeans and pulled her sweatshirt over her head, leaving herself in a thin t-shirt and knickers. She slid in beside Jack and put her arms around him, very gingerly.

He rested his head on her chest and sighed. “Thanks. God, this is miserable. Does every child on Earth in your time really go through this?”

“Not every child,” Rose said, “but a lot of them. It’s not as bad when you’re a kid, though - Tony wasn’t as sick as you. I wasn’t as sick as you either.”

Jack snuggled closer. “When did you have them?” he asked sleepily. She was feeling a bit drowsy herself, now that she was horizontal, warm, and comfortable. None of them had slept much since Jack had started showing symptoms.

“Mmm,” she said, thinking. “I must’ve been about four. This was in the other universe, of course, so it was just me and Mum. She’d just got this new job, and she didn’t have any sick time yet, so she hired this old lady who lived in our building to look after me.”

“That sounds terrible.”

“Nah, it was great.” Rose smiled. She hadn’t thought about this in years. “Mrs. Hamilton, I think her name was. She had loads of grandkids up in Scotland she didn’t get to see much, so she had all these kids movies - Mum and I didn’t even have a VCR - and books. Tons of books. She taught me card tricks. I couldn’t do most of them, my hands were too small, but I liked seeing them and then figuring out how they worked. But I just had a little fever and a whole bunch of pox.” She snickered suddenly. “Mum took a photo of me sitting in the bathtub covered in red spots. I used to hate that picture so much.”

Jack smiled - a genuine smile, Rose saw with satisfaction. “I bet you were adorable. Might have to get your mum to show it to me next time we visit.”

Rose shook her head. “You can’t. It’s in the other universe. No baby pictures of me at all in this one, not even of some other me. I never existed here before I came as an adult.”

Jack’s smile dimmed, just a bit. “Right. Sorry.”

She shrugged. “That’s just the way it is. It doesn’t bother me much, though I think it bothers Mum a lot. Anyway, it’s for the best, because if it did exist here, I’d be forced to take a similar photo of you, so as to prevent blackmail. And you, Jack Harkness,” she said, with a smile and a gentle jab to the chest, “are not nearly as cute as I was when I was four."

“I believe that,” the Doctor said, appearing suddenly with a tray, which held several pill bottles, one huge pot of anti-itch cream, and a steaming mug of chicken broth. He set it on the bedside table, picked up a bottle of pills, and shook two out onto his hand. “For your headache,” he told Jack, handing them over.

“I don’t have a headache."

“You’re lying, lad,” the Doctor replied bluntly. “Water. Pills. Now. Then we’ll try you on the broth. And you, Rose Tyler,” he added, when she made to get up, “stay right where you are. Neither of you slept last night.”

“It’d be more comfortable for Jack if I moved,” she pointed out, still halfway out of the bed. “I can take a nap in my room.”

The Doctor cocked an eyebrow and looked at Jack. “Jack?” he prompted.

“Stay, Rose,” Jack said. “I like having you here, really.”

“Oh,” Rose said. She looked at Jack, trying to gauge whether he was telling the truth or just trying to make the Doctor happy. That happened, sometimes, she’d noticed. “I just thought . . . you and the Doctor have been together a long time. It makes sense you’d be more comfortable with him.” Frankly, she wasn’t sure she’d want either of the blokes holding her hair back while she threw up. She was still at the stage where she was sneaking out of bed to brush her teeth before having supposedly spontaneous morning sex.

“Yeah, but it’s different now with all three of us.” Jack sighed and leaned his forehead against Rose’s arm, looking up at her with fever-bright eyes. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to make you feel -’

“You didn’t,” Rose assured him, even though he had, a bit. “It takes time to get that comfortable with someone. Look, do you really want me to stay? It’s all right if you don’t. You won’t hurt my feelings.” That last might not be strictly true, but she’d deal with it. It was more important right now for Jack to feel as comfortable as possible.

Out the corner of her eye, Rose caught the Doctor opening his mouth. She held her hand up. “I’m asking Jack, Doctor.”

Jack smiled, wanly. “I really want you to stay.”

Rose dropped a kiss on the tip of Jack’s nose, one of the few parts of him not currently spotted. “Then of course I’ll stay.”

The chicken broth, to Rose’s satisfaction and the Doctor’s visible relief, was a success. It put a little color back into Jack’s cheeks, and when he fell asleep with his arm slung around Rose’s waist and his face pressed into her side, it was a deep, healing sort of sleep. Rose let herself drop off for a much needed nap after that as well.

When she woke, hours later, it was to the _beep_ of the ear thermometer as the Doctor took Jack’s temperature. “38.7,” he reported quietly, when he saw she was awake.

“Good,” Rose mumbled. Better, at any rate. “Anything I can do?”

The brush of the Doctor’s fingers over her cheek made her smile. “You’re already doing it.”

 _Fin._


End file.
